And that is just what happened. After making arrangements with Miss Demorest for his ward to complete the winter term at the seminary, the Colonel departed, promising to return at the closing hour, but Geraldine said that she would like to walk to town with the other girls and that she would wait at Merry Lee’s house until Jack and Alfred returned from Dorchester. Then she and her brother could return together.
The Colonel noticed a slight flushing of her pretty face as she made the suggestion, and he wondered about it as he drove home through the crisp, sunlit morning.
After planning with Miss Demorest about the classes she would enter, Geraldine was told that she might wait in the library, where a cheerful fire was burning in the hearth, and that, after the midmorning recreation, she might accompany her friends to Miss Preen’s English class.
As Geraldine sat in the big comfortable chair in front of the fire, she had time to think how very different her stay in Sunnyside was turning out from what she had expected. How she had dreaded it, and how selfish and stubborn she had been! It was a wonder that the Colonel had even wanted her to stay; and how could that dear Mrs. Gray be so nice to her when she had snubbed her so rudely? Even the girls had been generous to overlook her snobbishness when they came to call upon her. She actually laughed aloud when she thought of the prank they had played upon her. Then she curled up in the chair and tried to hide, for the gong was announcing recess. A moment later merry laughter was heard as doors up and down the long corridor opened and the day pupils and boarding pupils emerged from their classes. Geraldine was wondering where her group of friends would go. She had hoped they would flock to the library, nor was she disappointed. Although she could not see them, she knew their voices. Merry was saying, “Girls, come in the library a minute. I have some news for you.”
“Is it secret?” Bertha asked.
“I’ll say it is—that is, just at first; after a time we’ll tell it to Geraldine. Are we all here? Close the door, will you; nobody will notice.”
“No, we’re not all here. Gertrude isn’t. Where can she be? Why didn’t she come to school today?” Rose wondered.
“That’s why I have called this special meeting,” Merry explained. “Gertrude has gone to Dorchester to spend the winter. It was very sudden; she didn’t have time even to call you all up to say good-bye. Her mother’s sister was taken very ill last night and they sent for Gertrude to take care of the children. Her aunt thinks everything of Trudie, and as she has to go to the hospital for an operation, she said she just couldn’t go contentedly unless Gertrude was there to look after her two babies. It will be spring before she can return.”
“Oh, I say, that is too bad! She’ll miss all the fun we’ve planned for this winter,” Bertha said. “But you have more to tell, Merry. What is it?”
“Yes, I have,” their president confessed. “Gertrude suggested that, since we need seven girls in our secret society, she would like us to invite——”